Pilgrimage [Western Fantasy] - Chapter 8
The city that once rested in a peaceful night now burned with ceaseless torches. Magical sigils lit up across rooftops, and figures in dark robes—mages, knights—moved like shadows through every alley and corridor. Whether it was the manicured gardens of nobles or the foul tunnels of the underbelly, no place was untouched.
Half-asleep beggars were dragged up roughly from the streets. Even towering orcs, belligerent and drunk, found cold spears pressed to their throats.
The capital had torn off its gleaming mask, revealing the beast beneath—feral, violent, and alert.
At the gates of the Temple of Light, Prince Edwin stood without his usual refined smile. His expression was frosted over, sharp with displeasure.
“The Sword Saint hasn’t regained consciousness?” he asked coolly.
The Pope and his senior priests were absent. A lone cardinal greeted him instead, his face pale, his confidence shaken under the weight of the prince’s wrath.
“His Holiness… and the others… are currently tending to Her Highness Estelle…”
At that, Edwin’s inner fury grew more turbulent. He suppressed the murderous surge behind a mask of calm charm—ironically making him appear even more terrifying. The cardinal involuntarily shivered.
In the center of it all lay Estelle, pale against the snowy linens of her bed. Her dark hair fanned out like spilled ink, a stark contrast to her ghostly stillness.
The Pope stood beside her, tall and somber, as if guarding a tomb rather than a bedside.
“She’s breathing. Her heart beats,” one of the senior priests murmured nervously, wiping sweat from his brow. “But…”
The Pope silenced him with a small gesture.
“Her soul,” he said gravely, “is no longer in her body.”
Wilder, the eldest son of a noble family, had rushed to the temple. He froze, stunned by the Pope’s declaration.
“You mean… she’s soulless?”
The Pope nodded. “I’ve already used extensive soul-tracing magic. It covered the entire capital—every inch—and still, there was no trace of Estelle’s soul.”
For someone of Estelle’s immense power, her soul should have shone like a beacon, impossible to miss. Yet it was nowhere.
“The conclusion,” the Pope continued, “is that Her Highness’s soul is not in the capital anymore.”
Wilder was visibly disturbed, though he kept his composure. “Is there… anything else we can do?”
“There is,” the Pope said softly, with the serene cadence of a sacred hymn. “But before that, we must make sure no one interferes.”
Black-robed agents swept across the capital like a murder of crows. The city fell into a tense hush—ominous and foreboding. Everyone could feel it: this was the quiet before something immense and terrible.
They were all searching for Estelle.
‘I… fainted?’
Estelle’s awareness returned slowly, as if surfacing from a dream too heavy to shake off. Her limbs were weighed down by something unnatural, her thoughts clouded by sleep.
She remembered collapsing in the Temple of Light. But now—where was she?
Her eyes opened with effort… and were immediately met by a hellish sky.
Everything burned red—crimson and black, like bl00d had been spilled across the heavens.
She instinctively reached for her sword—but her hand met only empty air.
“This isn’t the capital…” she whispered. “This aura… so thick with demonic energy…”
She was somewhere else entirely.
“Hibel?” she called into the void.
No response. Only her own voice echoing back.
Around her, rivers of lava carved their way across the scorched land, spilling into cliffs that dropped into black voids. Jagged caves pockmarked the charred mountainsides, and from the shadows, she felt eyes—red, unblinking, and ravenous.
Estelle clutched her head as another wave of pain rippled through her skull.
Wherever this place was, it wasn’t just dangerous—it was unnatural.
Still, she forced herself upright. She needed to understand her surroundings—and find a way out.
She moved forward, picking her way through cracked earth and swirls of toxic smoke.
The smoke did little to hinder her vision. Through it, she saw the outline of humanoid demons cloaked in fire, their wings twitching in the haze.
“Balrogs,” she noted calmly.
A burst of divine light shot from her fingers and sliced clean through one of the creatures. The rest shrieked in fury, raising spears of fire and hurling them toward her.
Dozens rained down like falling stars—only to be stopped mid-air, frozen solid by a burst of icy magic. The shattered remnants clattered harmlessly into the lava below.
Estelle didn’t smile.
She was beginning to piece it together.
The presence of lava… the rampaging Balrogs…
She was in the Exile Realm.
The creatures kept coming, their minds consumed by an unrelenting urge to kill. Their eyes—lizard-like, scale-ringed—were wide with bloodlust. They smashed against her ice walls with no concern for pain.
“They’re berserk,” she muttered. “Pure instinct. No mind left at all.”
She continued forward, her magic spearing through the attackers one by one.
Then—a roar.
Everything stilled.
The lava burst upward like a geyser. Estelle leapt to a high boulder, narrowly avoiding the eruption. The Balrogs weren’t so lucky—several were swallowed whole by the surge.
And then… she saw it.
A shadow blackened the sky, wings of bone stretched wide. Hollow eyes glowed with pale fire. Its skeletal body shimmered like armor forged from death itself.
A Bone Dragon.
The air turned to ice beneath its wings. Even the mindless Balrogs froze in fear, their primal urges snuffed out by sheer terror.
Estelle met its gaze.
Without warning, the dragon dove.
She didn’t flinch. Magma exploded across the mountain, trees were incinerated in seconds. But the bone dragon didn’t strike her.
Instead, it cleared the area—flinging flaming Balrogs into the abyss below.
Then it exhaled—not fire, but a chilling frost that spread across the earth, freezing everything it touched. Even the lava was sealed beneath crystalized ice.
The land of fire had turned to a kingdom of frost.
Satisfied, the bone dragon tucked its wings in and lowered its head, curling up to sleep.
Estelle cautiously stepped forward.
When she tried to leave, the creature lifted its head and blocked her with a soft growl. It bumped its snout against a nearby rock and wrapped its wings protectively around it.
“…Is it… guarding me?”
Her eyes narrowed. “Can you understand me?”
The dragon growled again—affirmation.
So it was intelligent. Ancient dragons often were.
Estelle’s heart sank.
“This is… a prison realm, isn’t it?”
The dragon nodded slowly.
She’d feared as much. The Exile Realm—a forgotten world of monsters and castaways.
“Can you take me out of here?”
She lowered the protective ice wall between them as a show of trust.
The bone dragon leaned down again, nudging her gently.
It wanted to help.
Estelle recalled the maps she’d studied—half the Exile Realm was scorched with magma, the other half buried in endless snow. Some of the darkest beings lived here: rogue mages, corrupted elves, beasts that once razed kingdoms. Humans, in their greed, often summoned these creatures for power… only to be consumed in the end.
The bone dragon took flight, and Estelle held on.
As they soared, a new shape rose in the distance—a crimson dragon, sleeping atop a molten peak. The heat shimmered around him, distorting the air.
His nostrils flared, flames leaking out. He opened his eyes and saw Estelle riding the bone dragon.
With a deep, disdainful voice, he sneered: “Nidhog, you let a human ride your sacred body?”
It was mockery—plain and sharp.
Estelle’s hand moved to her sword, prepared to remove that smug look from the red dragon’s face. But Nidhog stirred beneath her. He beat his wings, conjuring a frozen gust that uprooted an entire tree and hurled it at the red dragon.
The crimson beast retaliated, scorching the mountainside in a burst of flames. His rage boiled over.
“NIDHOG!!”
Scales as red as rubies shimmered in the blaze as he launched into the sky. His claws gleamed, his wings thundered as he charged toward them.
Estelle remained calm, though a glimmer of irritation creased her brow.
She glanced at the red dragon. His colors reminded her of a gemstone she once adored.
Beautiful… and arrogant.
Just as the red dragon surged toward them, Nidhog banked and unleashed a blast of pure frost—an ancient, breathless cold that swallowed flame and silenced the air.